While central banks use administered interest rates in hopes of emulating the natural rate, these efforts are always going to fail. Without free markets, there is no natural rate.
While court economists such as Paul Krugman insist that inflation is government's way of ensuring full employment, in reality, inflation is one of the many ways governments steal from productive people.
The call for "price stabilization" was part of the recent Republican debate. Despite its attractive appearance, having the Fed try to "stabilize prices" is a very bad idea.
There are no more rabbits for the Fed monetary magicians to pull out of their hats. In an economy addicted to artificially low interest rates, any more moves by the Fed will trigger an economic downturn.
While we criticize the Fed for its monetary predations over the past few years, we really should look at the harm the Fed has caused for more than a century. Its record is abysmal.
This year marks the sixtieth anniversary of Murray Rothbard’s classic work What Has Government Done to Our Money? We need your help getting it into the hands of a new generation.
Supposedly, the "big news" is the decline of inflation. However, the monetary and political forces driving the latest bout of inflation have not gone away.